Leadership
Don’s Diatribes-Leadership
The Ronald Reagan Presidential Foundation and Institute released their annual national defense survey, and it was startling. The percentage of the public that reported feeling confident in the military has plummeted from 70% in 2018 to 45% in 2021.
The survey was released last week after polling more than 2,500 U.S. adults. According to the Pentagon Press Secretary, John F. Kirby, the Secretary of Defense Lloyd J. Austin III has seen the survey and is concerned about what its results mean to the military. Although Secretary Austin has yet to provide any public comment, Kirby stated that Secretary Austin “wants to spend a little bit more time and try to see if there’s some wisdom he can glean from the survey. He obviously took it seriously when he had a chance to at least look at it briefly.”
It’s not just US citizens. The world looks to the United States to counter the growing threats from both China and Russia. But confidence in the US has eroded in a large part due to our unplanned and disorganized withdrawal from Afghanistan. It doesn’t take too much time to grasp an understanding of what the issue is.
It’s not the Soldiers. The issue is Military Leadership. When you have … Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Gen. Mark Milley follow a presidential photo op after having cleared demonstrators, that’s damaging. When that same Chairman brags in congressional testimony about reading Lenin and Marx or the importance of military officers understating “white rage”. The same Chairman denied that a military drone strike killed innocent civilians; yet in Congressional testimony later admitted that he was aware hours after the drone strike that civilians and noncombatants were accidently targeted.
The Intercept recently published an article titled “Stanley McChrystal Accidently Reveals the Dishonesty of U.S. Generals”. I recommend everyone read it! It’s an odd thing to look back on how (or what) has made McChrystal one of the biggest benefactors of the $14 Trillion in defense spending from our country since 9/11. This is the guy who was fired by President Obama (think about that, aside from Trump, there aren’t too many Commander’s in Chief that fire their General Officers). McChrystal was also one of the senior officers that covered up the fratricide killing of Pat Tillman. McChrystal is also responsible for the Afghanistan plan in 2009 that called for simply throwing more money and troops at the problem, and ultimately resulting in excessive civilian casualties and the reemergence of the Taliban.
As we move forward, our Soldiers and our citizens deserve better.
Don’s Diatribes
Originally published at https://medium.com on January 15, 2022.
